TAMPA, Fla. — Laura Lamon filed the wrongful death lawsuit filed against Sligh Petrol Mart operated by Anjiya C- Store Inc., for selling her 27-year-old son “defective capsules” of Kratom without any “warnings or instructions,” leading to his death.
ABC Action News was the first news organization to report on the death of Christopher Waldron. In September, Lamon sat down exclusively with ABC Action News to ask for more research to be done on Kratom and for stores to be held responsible for giving users instructions on use and proper dosing.
It was on July 7, that Lamon said her son became a statistic he never wanted. The 27-year-old's death is the first ever confirmed from using the herbal supplement Kratom in Hillsborough County.
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The Hillsborough County Medical Examiner’s Office autopsy report lists the cause of death as “intoxication by Mitragynine (Kratom)."
The toxicology report shows that Waldron’s levels for Mitragynine were 1.8 mg/L. That level, according to the toxicologist was extremely high compared to levels they’ve seen.
Associated Medical Examiner Leszek Chrostowski told ABC Action News reporter Michael Paluska if Waldron didn’t take Kratom, "the guy should be alive.”
The lawsuit alleges that “Sligh Petrol Mart failed to provide its customers, including Mr. Waldron with any reasonable warnings or instructions or with the capsules. The failure to provide a reasonable warning or instructions made the capsules unreasonably dangerous.”
“He didn't want to die, he didn't want to die,” Laura Lamon told ABC Action News during a September 2017 interview.
Lamon said her son struggled with an addiction to prescription painkillers for more than a decade. When she got the phone call from Tampa Police that her son might have died from an overdose; she assumed it was from a prescription painkiller.
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“I was shocked, I thought it would for sure be opiates, for sure. I had no idea about this,” Lamon said.
The lawsuit is suing Sligh Petrol Mart for negligence. Count 3 of the May 18 filing shows that Slight Petrol Mart displayed “the capsules next to over-the-counter oral medications and selling the capsules as a product taken orally when the capsules were not safe to orally ingest.”
Lamon said she found two empty packets of Optimized Plant Meditated Solutions (O.P.M.S.) Gold. On the front of the packet is the name of the supplement, Mitragyna Speciosa Botanical Extract. The back of the package says the product contains Mitragyna Speciosa Leaf Extract and that it contains 60mg of Mitragynine. There are no instructions on the packet, just a warning that says “only for use as a botanical specimen. Manufacturer of this product takes no responsibility for the misuse of this product.” Then it gives a link to their website for another disclaimer.
"If it were properly labeled than he would've had a chance, you know, to say OK I shouldn’t take this amount,” Lamon said. “Again, I don't know how much he took, but it was enough to kill him.”
